Christian Medical
College & Hospital
Christian
Medical College and Hospital, Vellore (CMC Vellore) is one of the largest medical centres in India. And also CMC Vellore ranked 2nd top medical
college in India next to AIIMS, Delhi. This century-old Christian institution
was founded by Ida S. Scudderand is in the city of Vellore in the southern state of Tamil Nadu, India.
The idea of starting a hospital
came to Ida
Sophia Scudder in the
late 19th century, when Ida visited her medical missionary father, John Scudder, Jr., at
his post in Tamil Nadu. One night,
Ida was asked to help three women struggling in difficult childbirth. Custom
prevented their husbands from accepting the help of a male doctor and, being
untrained at that time, Ida could do nothing. The next morning she was shocked
to learn that the women had died. She believed that it was a calling and a
challenge set before her by God to
begin a ministry dedicated to the health needs of the people of India,
particularly women and children. Consequently, Ida went back to America,
entered medical training and, in 1899, was one of the first women graduates of
the Weill Medical College of Cornell
University.
Shortly
thereafter, she returned to India and
opened a one-bed clinic in Vellore in
1900. In 1902, she built a 40-bed hospital. In 1909, she started the School of
Nursing and, in 1918, a medical school for women was opened under the name
Missionary Medical School for Women. The medical school was upgraded into a
university affiliated medical college granting the degree of M.B.B.S. in 1942,
under the name Christian Medical College. Men were admitted to this college in
1947, ten in a class of 35.
In
addition to the medical and nursing schools that she founded, Dr. Ida
frequented outlying villages and started a roadside dispensary in 1916. Over
the years, these roadside dispensaries were upgraded into rural health and
development programs.
The hospital now caters to 5500
outpatients, 2500 inpatients, 75 surgical procedures, 22 clinics, and about 30
births every day. CHAD, CONCH, and RUHSA workers go to the villages and rural
areas to raise awareness of disease prevention, health care and community
empowerment.
Each
year 60 students, of which at least 25 are women, are admitted for the
undergraduate medical course (M.B.B.S. of the Tamil Nadu Dr. M.G.R. Medical
University).
The Christian Medical College is
a referral tertiary care hospital. CMC graduates stay on to work in hospitals
affiliated to the Christian Medical Association of India.
The
college is owned and administered by the Christian Medical College Vellore
Association which is a Society registered under the Societies Registration Act
of India. The association is made up of 54 churches and other Christian medical
organisations. The Christian Medical College Council, which comprises the
members of the association and other Indian and foreign organisations, governs
the CMC Vellore Association. Vellore Christian Medical college is owned by The
Vellore Christian Medical College Foundation Inc] a private company located at
New York. The Vellore Christian Medical College Foundation Inc is headed by
Mr.Anish Mathai as Chairman and George Varughese as treasurer.
Scholarships are available to
students who need financial assistance. The students and the faculty live in a
residential campus. Training in Community Medicine involves daily village
visits to collect data about disease prevention awareness, child malnutrition,
living conditions, socio-economic status and education status.
No.
Beds: 2,695; of which 46 are Emergency, 168 are in ICUs, 248 are in community
facilities, 85 are for long-stay rehabilitation of physically disabled.
Patients: 1.9 million outpatients and 120,000 in-patients per year; comm.
outreach to 340,000 people Daily: 125 operations; 45 births; 25,635 laboratory
tests. Education: More than 110 courses including MBBS, Nursing, Allied Health
Sciences, many Postgraduate medical specialities, plus distance learning
courses and PhD programmes. Research: 230 publications in indexed peer reviewed
journals, the second largest number of medical research papers of any medical
college in India. Financial: Annual running expenses Rs.4,679 million;
charitable subsidies: Rs.657 million (healthcare) and Rs.357 million
(education).
The
city of Vellore, Tamil Nadu, lies between Chennai and Bangalore. It has a
spectacular fort, and increasingly attracts pilgrims to the “Golden Temple” at
nearby Sripuram. However it is known the world over as the home of the
Christian Medical College – a centre of excellence in medical services,
research and education. Every day it attracts more than 5,000 people from all
over India and other parts of the subcontinent.
CMC
Vellore was founded by an American missionary, Dr. Ida S. Scudder. Born in
South India in 1870, she spent most of her childhood in the US and was educated
there. Although her grandparents, parents and most other members of her
extended family had served as missionaries in India, this was not the life that
she wanted for herself. However one night, while visiting her parents at their
home in India, her life was turned around. Three well-to-do men came to the
house one after the other, with the same desperate story. Each of them had a
young wife in the throes of childbirth, but unable to deliver. The traditional
midwife had been unable to help. Would the young missy come and help deliver
the baby? Ida had no medical training at that point, and suggested that her
doctor father should go. However, owing to the social and religious customs of
the day, each of these men went away sadly saying that it was impossible for
another man to see their wives. With no doctor to look after them, these three
women and their babies all died that night. Ida took this as a clear signal
from God that she should strive to help the women and children of India. She
returned to the US to study as a doctor, graduating from Cornell University
Medical College in 1899 among the first batch of women. She started her medical
work in Vellore in 1900 using one room in her parents’ bungalow as a one-bedded
clinic-cum-dispensary. In view of her earlier experience, her focus was on
women and children; at that time there were hardly any women doctors in India.
Gradually
her reputation grew and with it the demand for her services. In 1902 she opened
the 40-bedded Mary Taber Schell Memorial Hospital, built using funds donated in
the USA. In 1924 a 267-bedded hospital was opened on a different site, which
has continued to expand there ever since. Today there are more than 2,500 beds
across four campuses, and the hospital caters to nearly every medical
speciality. It is equipped with a vast array of sophisticated equipment,
including two MRI and two CT scanners, two advanced Linear Accelerators, a
PET-CT Scan and the latest auto analysers in the laboratories. Education and
Training Right from the beginning Ida Scudder knew that she could have little
impact working on her own, and her vision was not just to treat, but also to
train others. So she began teaching “compounders” (modern day pharmacists) and
nurses. The first formal nursing course was started over a hundred years ago in
1909. Medical training for women began in 1918 with a Licensed Medical
Practitioner course. In 1942 the MBBS degree course was started and in 1947 the
College became coeducational. Today CMC Vellore offers, in addition to MBBS and
Nursing BSc and Diploma courses, 66 post graduate medical degrees, 35 Allied
Health Science courses, 8 further Nursing programmes and PhD programmes in
various disciplines. Training is available in fields as diverse as Dialysis
Therapy, Medical Records Science and Neurosurgery. In 2010 CMC was voted “2nd
best Medical College in India” (perceptual) and top rank (factual) in the
annual India Today survey and is consistently listed amongst the top colleges
for MBBS.
CMC has over 7,600 staff,
including over 1,200 doctors and 2,400 nurses. Most of these people are
involved in providing medical care although they may have teaching and research
responsibilities. Almost every clinical specialty is catered to, and many
departments are subdivided into units each of which may have particular
expertise in specific areas as well as providing services of a more general
nature. For example the Division of Surgery is further broken down into eight
units specializing in Head and Neck Surgery, Endocrine Surgery, Vascular
Surgery, Colorectal, etc.
CMC
is particularly well known for certain departments such as Gasteroenterology,
Neurosciences and Haematology (where it is a national leader in the treatment
of rare blood disorders and bone marrow transplantation). It also gives high
importance to less prominent specialties such as Rheumatology, Physical
Medicine and Rehabilitation, Developmental Paediatrics and Palliative Care.
Ophthalmology and Psychiatry departments are located on different campuses, as
is the Rehabilitation Institute.
There
are 95 wards including 15 ICUs. About 76% of the beds are in general wards and
are subsidised to reduce the financial burden on patients. There are 39 major
operation theatres and a further 18 facilities for minor procedures. An average
of 125 operations are carried out each day.
Diagnostic
services are provided in house by the Radiology Department, Nuclear Medicine
and the Laboratories. Radiology reporting is through a filmless digital system
(PACS), enabling doctors to view X-rays and scans on any computer on the
network. All laboratory test results are available through the hospital
intranet, as part of the “clinical workstation” hospital information system.
Many of CMC faculty and
alumni have received national and international rewards for their humanitarian
efforts and research contributions. The hospital itself was given the National
Citizens Award as India’s best employer in 2003, the MM Award for Excellence in
Healthcare and the Gurukulijyoti Award in 2007. In 2010 it was voted first
runner up for the award “India’s Best Multi Specialty Tertiary Care Hospital”,
and “India’s Most Socially Responsible Hospital” in the CNBCTV18s India
Healthcare Awards.
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